I have always liked the name “Hope,” a female name. The opposite of hope is despair, and we will never hear of a woman named “Despair.” If we use our imagination we can personify the two words, by visualizing one looking up and forward, the other is looking down. There has probably been both hope and despair in most people’s lives, even if it were just for a fleeting moment. I love a person who can get up in the morning with a smile on their face and hope in their eye. Each day, a new day, the first day of the rest of our life, a new start, a fresh start. The cobwebs of the mind are gone, fresh are our thoughts, and the whole earth appears renewed. We are baptized afresh in the morning sunlight, and we have the option to step forth a new person every single day. We leave the dark and dreary and enter the light of life with a bright hope for our new day. Orison S. Marden wisely said, “There is no medicine like hope, no incentive so great, and no tonic so powerful as expectation of something tomorrow.”
I have always been optimistic, wearing a smile a good share of my life to prove it. Many people have asked me over the years why I smile so much. My only answer has been because I am a happy person, a person who is optimistic and who has hope for his future and the future of his loved ones. What is not to smile about? Harvey Mackay has said that “While hope and optimism are not exactly the same, they are intrinsically linked.” Many people believe that both hope and optimism are passive, but for me they are both verbs. They both must incorporate a plan, a future view of things that represents a positive change, a brighter way. The view that better times are not only possible, but most probable and even inevitable, is an optimistic view. Mackay quoted Robert Schuller from his book titled Tough Times Never Last, But Tough People Do. ( Just) “Let someone utter the magic words, ‘It’s possible.’ (and) Buried dreams are resurrected. Sparks of fresh enthusiasm flicker. Tabled motions are brought back to the floor. Dusty files are reopened. Lights go on again in the darkened laboratories. Cell Phones start ringing. Typewriters make clattering music. Budgets are revised and adopted. ‘Help wanted’ signs are hung out. Factories are retooled and reopened. New products appear.”
Like the father whose Oklahoma home had been destroyed by a tornado for the third time, when asked what he is going to do now, said: “We are all alive, we still have each other, and what we are going to do now is start with what we can salvage and rebuild from the bottom up.” That is the optimistic view, the way of hope, the indomitable human spirit. Those people who roll up their sleeves and dig in to do what may seem to many to be an impossible task, they who refuse to give in…they are a shining inspiration to everyone around them. It is the American way, the American spirit. God bless America! The greatest country on God’s green earth. Why? Because Americans will never forget that “behind the clouds is the sun still shining.” We have faith in hope.